After Souichiro and Yuriko entered the mansion, Ryuji and Chihiro breathed a sigh of relief.

"That surprised me." Chihiro stated.

Ryuji was staring at his demon arm for a while before he absent mindedly responded. "Yeah…"

When she noticed what he was staring at, her mind wandered back to when he first pulled the bandages off his arm. The undead bit him, but he seemed immune to the disease and not only that, the wound he suffered instantly healed itself. There wasn't time to really ask anything back then, but now curiosity had finally gotten the better of her. "Senpai, that thing with your arm… how often does it happen?"

He scanned his surroundings and noticed the crowd of people that had gathered was in distress over the public decapitation of one of 'them.' They weren't rioting, but after Souichiro had left it became clear that they either didn't agree with his methods either. "Let's find a quieter place to talk."

The pair wandered around the property till they came upon a koi fish pond. They had certainly come to a much quieter place. The only sounds that could be heard were the koi swimming in the pond and the faint breeze blowing through the trees.

"I don't know much about this sort of thing, but these koi are beautiful." Chihiro stated breaking the awkward silence first.

Ryuji was clearly distracted as his gaze was on the pond and he only barely registered his kouhai's words. "Yeah…"

Awkward silence was becoming a recurring theme with them, but that wasn't enough to deter the first year from what she wanted to get across and that's when it hit her. "I may not be the best person to talk to about what you're going through, but if there's something on your mind, I'll gladly listen. However, if you'd rather not talk about it, I understand."

Ryuji shifted his attention to his kouhai only to find her smiling back at him.

"Listening to each other's problems and consoling each other goes both ways Senpai."

It was no use, he couldn't say no to her even if he wanted to. "This is supposed to be a secret, but with everything that happened I guess it doesn't really matter anymore."

Chihiro inaudibly gulped in anticipation of what he was about to say. She couldn't help getting a little excited despite the serious atmosphere since her beloved senpai was opening up to her about something important.

"Have you ever heard of 'Kazan Syndrome' before?"

Chihiro took a moment to process the term, before she responded. "No, I can't say that I have, but it sounds like some type of disease."

"You're half right. Actually, you've seen it before." Ryuji stated as he held up his bound arm for her to see.

Chihiro remembered when he revealed his left arm to her, but she didn't have the time to process what she saw considering they were about to be surrounded by a horde of the undead back then and there wasn't a good time to bring it up afterwards either till now. Reflexively, she took his hand and started examining it noting all its unique features. The entirety of his left arm was completely red like the color of blood from the base of his arm to the tips of his fingers. His fingernails looked sharper than normal almost resembling a claw and across his arm were these thick visible veins. With her finger, she traced along one of the veins in his arm till she came to a certain spot. "Did it hurt?"

"Yes, I feel pain just like anyone else." Ryuji confirmed realizing she was referring to the time he was bit by one of 'them' saving her. "I just heal fast."

"I see…" She hummed as if contemplating something to herself. A few more seconds passed before she realized she was still gripping his arm, but just as she was about to let go she looked up and stopped when she met his gaze.

It seemed as much as Chihiro was into learning more about her senpai, Ryuji was just as interested in learning more about his kouhai. The both of them just stared at each other expecting the other to say something, but just as they were about to pick up where they left off another voice called out to them.

"That's an interesting conversation you're having there, mind if I join in?"

Ryuji tensed up. "Sensei…?" He slowly turned around to see the woman in question walking towards them.

Chihiro quickly pulled away from her senpai and gave her a slight bow. "Good afternoon, Kokonoe-san."

"Polite as always I see." Kokonoe complimented before turning her attention to Ryuji. "You should learn from her example."

The third year internally sighed.

Noticing this, Chihiro quickly changed the subject. "Kokonoe-san, you seem so busy the past few days. If it's not too much trouble, do you mind telling us what you've been up to?"

"Yuriko asked me to fix something for her sort of speak. It took longer than I thought and I even had to have the ranger acquire some parts for me from the outside, but it should be done by tomorrow." Kokonoe answered.

"So what brings you out here then?" Ryuji asked.

"I'll get straight to the point then. I have some time on my hands before I have to get back to work, so I'd like to perform a 'checkup' on you while I have the chance. It's been over a year since the last one." She stated in a serious tone.

"I understand."

"If you get it, then follow me." She turned around and started to walk away. "Bring her as well, you two weren't done talking right?"

Ryuji and Chihiro looked at each other before silently following the doctor.

Meanwhile…

Reo confidently swung open the door to Souichiro Takagi's office and strode right in. "Long time no see, Uncle Souichiro."

Her sudden outburst was greeted with looks of confusion and surprise from the men inside who were all seated at a long oval dining table. As their uniforms suggested, all of them worked for the head of the Takagi household and it seemed they were in the middle of working. One man was on the phone with a note pad in his other hand, another was diligently typing away on a laptop, while two others were in the middle of sifting through a stack of papers. As the confusion subsided, the workers all started to wonder how she got past the guards who were posted just outside the door. The moment they were about to bring it up, their question was immediately answered by Saya Takagi entering the room after Reo. Past the group of workers was Souichiro Takagi seated at his own personal office desk at the back of the room and Yuriko Takagi who seemed to be in the middle of a conversation with him when they entered. "Well, if it isn't Arisawa's daughter. You've grown since the last time I saw you. I'd ask why you're here, but Yuriko just explained the situation to me." He said acknowledging her presence.

"Good that makes this simple then. We need to talk." Reo stated.

"Leave us."

Upon hearing his order, the men under his employ stopped what they were doing and quietly left the room. As they left, the rest of Takashi's group started to funnel in as one by one they took pause the moment they saw the head of the Takagi family. The events of today still fresh in their minds only set to further increase how intimidated they were by him that even little Alice could pick up on the tension they felt. The only two people in the room who were unfazed aside from Yuriko were Saya who crossed her arms looking annoyed about something and Reo who had her hands on her hips grinning from ear to ear.

The moment Souichiro felt his men were out of earshot, he released a sigh he was holding and his facial expression softened. "I'm glad you're safe Saya."

The pinkette had mixed feelings about what her father just said, but chose to keep it to herself releasing a sigh of her own. "I'm glad you and mama are both safe too."

He then turned his attention to the rest of the group and expressed his gratitude. "Thank you for protecting our daughter."

Takashi stepped forward and all eyes were on him now. "With all due respect sir, you don't need to thank us. We relied on Saya as much as she relied on us and even then it was Reo who ultimately saved our entire group."

"Reo-chan always had a knack for saving our daughter." Yuriko smiled.

Saya raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean by that?"

"I wonder…" Her mother said in a teasing tone.

"Auntie Yuriko…" Reo interrupted. "I'm all for making jokes at your daughter's expense, but I think we should get down to business."

The pinkette had a few choice words for the both of them, but didn't want to derail the conversation more than they already had.

"Fair enough…" The older woman responded.

"The real reason I'm here is to inform you that the operation has concluded more or less. That and I thought I'd oversee the final part of this mission by helping Ryu and his girlfriend personally." Reo explained before winking at Saya's parents in a playful manner.

Souichiro was quite used to the brunette's fun-loving personality and wasn't bothered in the slightest by her informal tone. "Then it's finally time to put second phase of the plan into action."

"Plan…? What plan…? And what 'operation' is she talking about?" Saya asked.

Seeing no point in hiding it anymore, Reo turned around to face Saya and her friends. "Our government knew this would happen."

"Wait a moment." Takashi chimed in as he pinched the bridge of his nose to try and compose himself, a gesture which looked very Saya-like to Reo. "You're saying our government knew that corpses of the deceased would reanimate and start feeding on the living like a real life horror movie?"

"Well not exactly that, but something like it." The brunette answered.

He clenched his fists as his voice took on a harsher tone. "So they knew and said nothing until it was too late to do anything about it?"

Sensing his change in mood she tried her best to explain their reasoning behind their decision. "They decided it'd be best to keep it quiet so as to not create unnecessary panic and-"

"Stop bullshitting me!"

His group of friends was surprised by his outburst, while Reo and Saya's parents seemed undeterred by his outburst.

Saeko was the first one to speak up and get Takashi's attention. "We need you to calm down so she can explain."

"I'm as calm as I'm going to get!"

Just then the male teen felt a pair of arms wrap around his torso and something soft press against his back. He craned his neck to see Rei hugging him.

"Takeshi…" Rei said softly, but loud enough so everyone could hear. "I understand your feelings. I'm frustrated too. If the government warned us of the impending danger, we could've been prepared. We wouldn't have found ourselves suddenly separated from our families and a lot of our friends back at Fujimi wouldn't have had to die."

"If we knew then maybe Daddy would still be alive." Alice stated as she was on the verge of tears recalling the traumatic event.

It was then that Zeke walked up to Alice and barked getting her attention. Knowing the puppy was trying to cheer her up she knelt down and pet him. Shizuka knelt down beside her and placed a reassuring hand on the young girl's shoulder which finally made her smile.

The entire scene made the others think of their families. Kohta's parents were out of the country, so there was nothing he could do about being separated from them. Saeko's only living parent was her father, but she was confident where ever he was he could take of himself. Saya was the luckiest person out of their group being reunited with her both her parents so quickly after everything happened. Even if they had their disagreements, she was at least thankful for that.

Realizing he put a serious damper on the mood, Takeshi released a sigh and with it all the tension he felt up to this point. "I'm sorry."

Sensing the atmosphere, Souichiro decided to address their concerns. "There's no need to apologize. You have every right to be angry. From your perspective, you feel the government has failed you and maybe it has. However, this was the best they could do given the circumstances. We're not asking you to agree with us, we're just asking you to listen."

"Very well Papa, I'm listening." Saya turned her attention to Reo. "So what's this 'plan' or 'operation' you mentioned?"

"Like I said earlier, the government knew this would happen, so they came up with a plan should the worse come to past. Sort of like an in case of apocalypse, break glass kind of a deal. Anyway, you've seen the group that Ryu and Chi-chan came with, right?"

Once the brunette mentioned the grade school class, every other piece of information that Saya had up to this point clicked. "The children…"

"That's my girl. It seems you figured it out." Yuriko smiled.

Everyone else who wasn't in the know seemed more lost than ever.

"Figured what out? Sorry the rest of us are a little slow on the up take." Takashi stated.

"They couldn't stop the world from happening so they tried to make sure the next generation would survive it instead. Since no one showed up at our high school, I assume they targeted junior high and grade schools. Maybe they went a step further and included kindergartens, day-care centers, and hospitals too. I just don't get how they pulled it off though. Even if you pool the entire countries resources, evacuating that many children in such a short amount of time is impossible." Saya explained.

"Impossible?" Reo repeated with a sly grin. "Is that what you think?"

The pinkette knew she'd regret asking, but this was her chance for answers and she wasn't about to pass it up. "What do you mean?"

"Saya-chan, did you really think I was the only dungeon fighter out there?"

AN: I know that last chapter I said it'd be a while before I update, but damn… It's been over a year now. Well for anyone who's still keeping up with this story, I'm back now. I'll try not to keep you waiting for another year for the next one and like with this chapter, the next chapter will be more exposition and reveal exactly what's been going on behind the scenes. In other news, the level cap in DFO has been moved to 90 and Pandemonium is finally here. That's all I have for now. I'll see you guys next time around.